ock, and when the
object was quadrilles, had duly taken place, about this time; and
the young gentlemen, with no unbecoming demonstrations of levity, had
betaken themselves, in a state of scholastic repletion, to their
own homes. Mr Skettles had repaired abroad, permanently to grace the
establishment of his father Sir Barnet Skettles, whose popular manners
had obtained him a diplomatic appointment, the honours of which were
discharged by himself and Lady Skettles, to the satisfaction even of
their own countrymen and countrywomen: which was considered almost
miraculous. Mr Tozer, now a young man of lofty stature, in Wellington
boots, was so extremely full of antiquity as to be nearly on a par with
a genuine ancient Roman in his knowledge of English: a triumph that
affected his good parents with the tenderest emotions, and caused
the father and mother of Mr Briggs (whose learning, like ill-arranged
luggage, was so tightly packed that he couldn't get at anything he
wanted) to hide their diminished heads. The fruit laboriously gathered
from the tree of knowledge by this latter young gentleman, in fact,
had been subjected to so much pressure, that it had become a kind of
intellectual Norfolk Biffin, and had nothing of its original form or
flavour remaining. Master Bitherstone now, on whom the forcing system
had the happier and not uncommon effect of leaving no impression
whatever, when the forcing apparatus ceased to work, was in a much more
comfortable plight; and being then on shipboard, bound for Bengal, found
himself forgetting, with such admirable rapidity, that it was doubtful
whether his declensions of noun-substantives would hold out to the end
of the voyage.

When Doctor Blimber, in pursuance of the usual course, would have said
to the young gentlemen, on the morning of the party, 'Gentlemen, we will
resume our studies on the twenty-fifth of next month,' he departed from
the usual course, and said, 'Gentlemen, when our friend Cincinnatus
retired to his farm, he did not present to the senate any Roman who he
sought to nominate as his successor.' But there is a Roman here,' said
Doctor Blimber, laying his hand on the shoulder of Mr Feeder, B.A.,
adolescens imprimis gravis et doctus, gentlemen, whom I, a retiring
Cincinnatus, wish to present to my little senate, as their future
Dictator. Gentlemen, we will resume our studies on the twenty-fifth of
next month, under the auspices of Mr Feeder, B.A.' At this (which
Docto